luckadjusted

Referee calls · 2019–2026

Do refs favor the Cowboys?

No more than most teams. Judgment calls have been worth +0.20 wins a season to the Cowboys since 2019, 10th of 32 teams. In the playoffs: −4.8% of a win a game over 4 games, a small sample that swings on a handful of flags.

Call luck, season by season

Wins from judgment calls each regular season: the calls that helped the Cowboys minus the calls that hurt them, each weighted by the moment it came.

SeasonGamesCalls, winsLeague rankFlags againstFlags forPlayoffs, wins
20262+0.06 12th1010 –
202517+0.76 7th8080 –
202417+1.48 2nd6781 –
202317+1.16 1st7066 0.00 (1)
202217+0.51 6th6454 −0.02 (2)
202117−1.10 32nd8077 −0.18 (1)
202016−1.35 31st5953 –
201916−0.14 17th7268 –

Biggest calls for the Cowboys

  1. Illegal Use of Hands on the Vikings (Harrison Smith), 5 yards, wiping out the play · 2021 Week 8 · 38 pts of win probability
  2. Offensive Pass Interference on the Giants (Damion Ratley), 10 yards, wiping out the play · 2020 Week 5 · 26 pts of win probability
  3. Roughing the Passer on the Eagles (Haason Reddick), 15 yards · 2023 Week 9 · 26 pts of win probability
  4. Offensive Holding on the Chargers (Jared Cook), 10 yards, wiping out the play · 2021 Week 2 · 25 pts of win probability
  5. Offensive Holding on the 49ers (Eric Saubert), 10 yards, wiping out the play · 2024 Week 8 · 23 pts of win probability

Biggest calls against

  1. Offensive Pass Interference on the Cowboys (Michael Gallup), 10 yards, wiping out the play · 2020 Week 1 · 94 pts of win probability
  2. Defensive Pass Interference on the Cowboys (Anthony Brown), 33 yards · 2021 Week 12 · 43 pts of win probability
  3. Offensive Holding on the Cowboys, 10 yards, wiping out the play · 2021 Week 1 · 31 pts of win probability
  4. Offensive Pass Interference on the Cowboys (George Pickens), 10 yards, wiping out the play · 2025 Week 2 · 29 pts of win probability
  5. Offensive Holding on the Cowboys, 10 yards, wiping out the play · 2021 Week 12 · 21 pts of win probability

Questions

Do refs favor the Cowboys?

No more than most teams. Judgment calls have been worth +0.20 wins a season to the Cowboys since 2019, 10th of 32 teams.

What about the playoffs?

In the playoffs: −4.8% of a win a game over 4 games, a small sample that swings on a handful of flags.

How is this measured?

Every flag that isn’t a pre-snap foul (holding, pass interference, roughing, unnecessary roughness and the like) is valued by what it did to the helped team’s chance of winning at that moment, including any play it wiped out. The same holding call is worth nothing when the game is decided and most of a win at the turn of a close one. A flag on a player who is rarely flagged counts more (up to twice), one on a frequent offender less. A team’s call luck is the calls that helped it minus the calls that hurt it. It says how the calls went, not why: teams that throw deep draw more pass interference, for example.

Is it more than chance?

Mostly not. A team’s call luck in odd weeks barely predicts its call luck in even weeks (correlation 0.06 across all teams since 2019), which is what chance looks like. Over 32 teams, a few will always sit at the top of this list.

All teams, 2026 · Referee crews · Dallas Cowboys, every season